


Nothing Special

by TabbbyWright



Category: Fate/Grand Order
Genre: F/F, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 07:59:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14100960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TabbbyWright/pseuds/TabbbyWright
Summary: Gudako's been at Chaldea for about a month, and in that time she's succeeded in pissing off the Director, getting herself banned from all missions and getting stuck on cleaning duty indefinitely. Not off to a great start, but it's normal enough until she runs into a strange girl with violet eyes and her pet squirrel-cat-thing and later, master candidate 48. Maybe she won't be doomed to cleaning duty forever after all...A novelization of sorts of FGO with both protagonists and some shipping. I'll add tags as needed! Updates very slowly.





	Nothing Special

Gudako had only been at Chaldea a month so far, and yet she had managed to piss off the Director not only once, but _twice_ and successfully gotten herself banned from missions until the director either forgot, or forgave her. Neither of these seemed to be happening any time soon, if ever.

So here she was, begrudgingly cleaning floors. Even so, she would be done soon and honestly? She _liked_ it here. People didn’t think she was weird (or they weren’t open about it anyway), nor did they think she was too loud. People willingly (even happily!) talked to her.

So this sucked, but she was far from miserable about it. Besides—the director wasn’t wrong in their assessment of her: she had no training as a mage and she didn’t even come from a mage family. All she had were some good magic circuits or whatever and that _might_ (maybe) make her useful one day.

Maybe.

With a grunt, she hauled the bucket of water she had been using to a nearby drain and dumped it, careful to avoid splashing herself in the process. She had done that her first day of mopping, and she couldn’t say it was an experience she was interested in repeating. She gathered up the rest of her supplies, dumping them in her now empty bucket, put her mop over her shoulder and carefully walking across the slick floor and down the pristine white hall. Her shoes squeaked lightly on the tile.

She would put all of this away, alert her supervisor… get dinner, play her idol games for awhile…

“Fou!”

“Fou—Fou, come back!”

Gudako turned around in time to see a small white _something_ come dashing down the hall—

Straight towards her—

It jumped, hitting her in the chest, and knocking her off balance—

And flat on her ass.

“Ow…” Gudako winced—was her tailbone broken? God, she hoped not. She’d heard those kinds of injuries were the worst back when she went to high school and she sure as shit wasn’t going to be useful to anyone if her ass was literally broken.

“I-I’m so sorry!” Gudako shifted her focus to see a flustered girl with glasses looking at her—her eyes were violet.

 _Whoa._ Gudako had never seen anyone with eyes that color, and they didn’t look like contacts… Her hair was pink too… She couldn’t be human, could she?

“I…” _Get it together!_ “It’s, uh, it’s okay! I’m not hurt or anything I don’t think.”

Gudako forced a laugh, looking down at her cleaning items, now spread across the floor. The creature was looking at her curiously and no matter how much she looked at it, she couldn’t identify what it _was_. She turned her attention back to the girl.

“I mean, it’s not like you sicced him on me, y’know?” Gudako paused, “Wait, you didn’t, did you?”

“N-No! I don’t know why he did that… Fou, why did you do that?”

“Fou!” The creature chirped and chose that moment to get _on_ Gudako, climbing up on top of her head and making itself comfortable.

“Fou, that’s not—Oh!” The girl smiled softly at the creature as he rested atop Gudako’s head, “He likes you! He doesn’t really like anyone besides me… That makes you his second caretaker!”

Gudako spaced out for a moment, staring at her before quickly looking away, “S-So uhm…” This wasn’t the first cute girl she’d seen at Chaldea, she needed to get a grip, “I uh, don’t know much but are you a servant or something? I’ve never met someone with eyes like yours.”

“Ah, no, I’m nobody important like that…” She looked a little sad when Gudako looked back at her.

“Sorry for asking something weird like that!” Gudako said quickly, “It’s not like I’m anyone important either, so that’s fine! What’s your name?”

“... I’m not sure I’m important enough to tell you that much…”

_What?_

Gudako stared blankly at her, and after a moment, the girl awkwardly continued, like she had never uttered these words before.

“I’m Mashu Kyrielight. I’m just a regular clerk here at Chaldea.”

Gudako felt a little better hearing this, though if Mashu was a regular clerk here, why hadn’t Gudako seen her before?

“Nice to meet you! I’m Gudako Fujimaru. One of the master candidates—”

A crackle overhead and Gudako looked up instinctively until she felt claws digging into her head for balance. She winced, putting her head back down. Fou weighed so little she’d forgotten he was there at all.

“The time is 1700. Dinner is now being served until 1900. Please report to the cafeteria before closing times. I repeat, the time is 1700…”

Gudako opened her mouth to ask if Mashu was new here or something when she felt the paws dig into her head and the little creature leapt off, running again.

“Fou! I’m sorry, Senpai, but I’m supposed to keep him out of trouble—it was nice meeting you!”

Mashu stood quickly, taking off after the ball of fluff that seemed to wait for her at the end of the hallway. Gudako sat there a moment, winded by the whole thing before carefully standing, assessing that her ass was probably in fact _not_ broken. She didn’t really know what to think of Mashu and her pet (or whatever that thing was). Mashu didn’t feel like a normal person by any stretch, and Fou wasn’t a cat or a squirrel or a rabbit or anything mundane and normal either.

Besides that, why had Mashu called her ‘senpai?’ Was she younger than Gudako? How did she know that much when Gudako didn’t know anything about Mashu at all? Was she even Japanese? Why would a foreigner use that term?

Gudako gathered up her spilled supplies and picked up her mop again, shrugging it off for the moment. If she ran into Mashu again later (and she hoped she would) she would ask more questions then. She certainly had plenty already!

 

**/ / /**

 

Mistakes had been made.

Gudako woke up to the sound of the building wide bell for the end of breakfast, stiff, dressed, her phone out of battery and on the floor. She had put far, far too much into grinding the event last night…

She groaned, rolled over and laid there for a minute, feeling like death warmed over. She was sure the Director would hear about this, and she was sure that this really sealed her fate as Chaldea’s Maid. She should go back to bed…

She laid there a few minutes, waiting to drift off, waiting for exhaustion to knock her out… Nothing.

She sat up, blinking blearily. Of course her circadian rhythm was working. Great. Good. Too fucking late.

She grabbed her phone of the floor, plugging it in and making sure the little battery meter appeared before dragging her sorry excuse for a corpse into the bathroom. Maybe this would make her feel better…

…

Walking down the hall to the cafeteria awhile later, she determined that she did not, in fact, feel better at all. She still felt like death warmed over—but hey, at least her phone was charged now. Maybe she would get lucky and the Director would be too busy with important things to notice her today. That would be great—amazing—wonderful, even.

Breakfast was long since over by the time Gudako got to the cafeteria, but they had coffee all day so she poured herself a mug of that with a liberal amount of milk.This counted as food, right? Yes. Definitely food.

She took a seat at one of the tables, and for a few minutes it was just her and her coffee and the bliss of being high in the rankings. She drank her coffee, thinking of how much of her salary she could put into the next gacha—would she want to? She didn’t know what cards were coming next… She hoped they weren’t all shit like last time. Not that it was the end of the world or anything—she did have other idol games to put her money into, after all.

If she ranked, she would get what, four copies of the tier-only event card? That would be good… really good… She liked seeing her name in the rankings. Made her feel like all the hours and dollars she sank into this game were worth something.

She still felt awful today though—she wouldn’t stay up all night to maintain her ranking this time. Probably.

She put her head on the table with a groan. She had to stop feeling like shit eventually, right? Right?

“Excuse me—”

“Gah!”

Gudako jumped in her seat, looking up to see an equally startled boy with a sandwich. Why the hell did _he_ get food?

… Who was he, anyway? Short black hair, icy blue eyes… he wasn’t as otherwordly as Mashu, but two strangers in two days after literally everyone else was already here and had been for awhile? Weird.

“... What?” Was he going to report her to the Director? She picked up her mug, drinking the remains of her lukewarm coffee and maintaining eye contact. He squirmed.

“Uh… Do you mind if I sit here? I just got here and don’t really know anyone yet.” He said sheepishly, breaking eye contact before she did.

Gudako shrugged and then realized her mug was empty. She set it on the table, glaring into the base of it.

“... Is something wrong?”

“I’m out of coffee and I still feel like crap.”

“I could go get you some?”

“Really?”

“Sure.”

Gudako thrust the mug into his empty hand.

“Good—great—sit with me _anytime_.” This was off to a good start! She liked this guy.

He laughed easily, setting his sandwich on the table.

“I’ll be back then.”

Gudako turned her grumpiness to his sandwich, staring at it, resisting the urge to steal it. That would be pretty shitty of her—after all, this guy was nice enough to bring her coffee in exchange for a place to sit. Not that she would’ve denied him anyway—she remembered sitting alone for lunch every day at her old school, and she wasn’t interested in inflicting that on anyone else.

She took a moment to pull out her phone, checking her ranking. As the boy came back, she noted her ranking was still in roughly the same spot. Good.

“Here you go.”

He set her mug in front of her—coffee with milk—along with a sandwich. With the processing capacity of a snail, she stared at it.

“For me?”

“No, it’s mine, I just wanted to taunt you with it.”

She eyed him suspiciously.

“I saw you eyeing mine so I thought I’d bring you one. I figured you weren’t allowed to have food for some reason so I told them I was really hungry. Do you… not want it?”

“I want it.” Gudako said quickly, tearing off the wrapper and shoving a corner of it in her mouth, “Whaf your mame?”

He was staring at her for a moment before turning his attention to his own meal, doing everything far more politely than she was, “You can call me Ritsuka.”

She swallowed, took a drink of her coffee, regretted the decision and made a mental note that whatever this sandwich was, it absolutely _did not_ go with coffee. She winced, and he was staring at her again.

“Uh…”

“I’m fine. Thank you for the food and the coffee, Ritsuka!” She tried a friendly smile, wondering what his family name was. If he didn’t mention it though, there was surely a reason.

“I’m Gudako Fujimaru.” She took a bite of her sandwich, chewing, swallowing, “I overslept this morning, and when you sleep through meals you don’t get to eat.”

She looked between the sandwich and the coffee, taking a quick drink, ignoring the weird taste as best she could and then tearing through the rest of whatever the hell this was made of. Bread and mysteries.

“That’s… fair I guess.” Ritsuka thoughtfully chewed on a bite of sandwich, “So they’re pretty strict around here?”

“Yeah—it’s not horrible, but there’s not a lot of slack,” Gudako’s sandwich was gone too soon, “If you make the director upset though, she’ll take you off the missions.”

“Hm… Is she sensitive?”

“Yes. She takes everything super personally and it’s really annoying.” Gudako went back to her coffee, even though she was finally feeling more awake, “Actually— _are_ you one of the master candidates?”

“Yeah—Number 48. Are you?”

“I’m number 47. Do your best not to piss her off like I did.”

“I take it she took you off the missions?”

“Until further notice, which probably means I’ll die of old age before she forgives me or forgets.”

“Wow.”

“If you’re super powerful she might be more forgiving but I wouldn’t bet on it.”

Ritsuka didn’t have anything to say in response to that, quietly finishing off his sandwich. Gudako busied herself with doing some friend point pulls—she didn’t have anything better to do right this minute anyway. Might as well burn through some of the zillion pulls that were available…

“I take it you’re not going to the briefing in a little bit then?” Ritsuka asked as he folded up a straw wrapper.

“Nope. I’ll be cleaning.”

“Cleaning?”

“Cleaning. All I do is clean.”

“Don’t they need you for missions in _some_ way?”

“I’m replaceable. It’s okay though—I’m good at cleaning, and someone has to do it.”

Part of her wanted to go on this mission—actually, all of her did. She ignored the urge though—the thirst for adventure and danger. She wasn’t a capable mage—she _absolutely_ was not cut out for the missions in the first place. She’d screw something up and get people killed.

“All masters, please report to the command room for briefing. All masters, please report to the command room for briefing. Thank you.”

Gudako grabbed his sandwich wrapper along with hers and took his empty mug, “That’s your cue. You better go before you piss her off on your first day.”

“Ahaha… I’ll do my best to stay on her good side. Good luck cleaning, Fujimaru.”

“Thanks—Good luck on your mission!”

As he left the cafeteria, she could only hope that he’d come back alive.

 

**/ / /**

 

“That’s the last of them…” Gudako stretched and then sighed, looking at her neatly packed away towels. A job well done. Next thing was mopping part of the gym…

She made her way to the other storage closet, grabbing her familiar bucket, her mop, cleaning fluid… There was a water spigot down there she could use to fill up before she got to wo—

_BOOM!_

The building shook, the lights went out, and Gudako reflexively grabbed the doorway, though the shaking was brief enough. She gripped the handle of her mop, carefully stepping out into the hallway. What the hell _was_ that? It didn’t sound like an avalanche… Could you even be involved in an avalanche when you were six thousand meters above sea level?

“A fire has broken out in the Central Power Station and the Central Command Room. The Central area’s containment wall will activate in ninety seconds. All staff must evacuate from gate two at once. Repeat—”

What the hell?

The lights flickered back on after a moment, blinding Gudako. She squeezed her eyes shut, blinked furiously and squinted as her eyes adjusted. Red light bathed the hallway—there was no way this was a drill or something…

Was everyone in the command room okay?

She quickly made her way down the hall, fears confirmed as she could smell burning and see the after effects—ceiling cracked, plaster on the floor. She bit her lip, hesitating. What could she do?

She had to do _something._

She steeled herself and ran down the next hall to the command room until she couldn’t anymore, carefully stepping over debris and using her mop to gently test weaker spots. The heat was uncomfortable, growing more so the further she went until she jumped down to the ground.

Even amongst all the fire and debris, Gudako could see that Chaldeas had gone dark, and dread hit her like a truck. Didn’t that mean everyone was doomed and dead?

“Fou!”

Fou was running circles around her, chirping anxiously.

“Fou, fou!”

“Are there survivors, Fou?”

“Fou!”

She took that as a yes and followed after the creature as it took off again. Was Mashu okay then? That would be a relief, even if only one person survived this… but what happened? Where was the Director? Where was _anyone_?

“Generator operation stopped. Power level critical. Switching to the backup generator. Error: please make switch manually.”

She didn’t like the sound of that message, but maybe it meant that people were trying to address the power before they came down here and tried to put out the fire.The heat made her eyes hurt but she kept them open—kept looking—until she saw pink.

“Mashu!” She ran to the girl’s side, dropped to her knees on the hot ground and froze as she noticed the blood pooling—smelled it burning. Gudako slowly took in the sight, realizing that Mashu’s lower body was crushed under a huge piece of debris—one that Gudako had no hope of moving. No _human_ could move this…

“Sen...pai?” Gudako tore her gaze away and focused on Mashu’s face, which was mostly okay, aside from a little blood trickling down her forehead. Gudako could… Gudako could talk to her, at the very least, right? She could do that much. That was the least she could do…

Fou made himself comfortable on Mashu’s shoulder, letting out a pitiful little whine. Gudako grimaced as she heard the next warning go off. Forty seconds? There was no way she’d be able to get back out of here in time. She had to hope that someone would come after the power was fixed. For now, she’d try to comfort the dying girl.

“Hey! Um, I was hoping that if we ran into each other again, it would be under better circumstances, ahaha… Not like… this…” Gudako looked away awkwardly for a moment, “I think help is on the way…”

Mashu made a soft sound, “Mm… that’s good…”

She sounded so weak… Gudako was gonna beat the shit out of whoever did this. How many others were hurt? Dead? Was anyone gonna survive this?

“Say, um, do you have any idea who did this?”

“No. There was just a giant explosion… No one came in and set it off or anything…” Mashu weakly turned her head towards Chaldeas, “Ah…”

Gudako turned to look too, her eyes widening as she took in how _red_ it was. Chaldeas was not supposed to be red. Mashu mumbled something, her head dropping to the ground. On impulse, Gudako cautiously took her hand.

“Thank you, Senpai…” Her eyes closed.

“System switching to the final phase of Rayshift.”

_Rayshift?! It’s still running…?_

“Coordinates: AD 2004, January 30th, Fuyuki, Japan.”

This… This definitely wasn’t good. There was no way this was good. The announcement droned on, but Gudako could only hear her heartbeat. She had no training… Was it pulling someone in the coffins? But there wasn’t any power to do that…

The area was sealed. Three minutes to go.

Gudako realized she was trembling and tried to make it stop, to no avail. This was terrifying. This was more terrifying than anything she’d ever dealt with. The Director was right—there was no way she was cut out for this.

“Baseline not reached. Rayshift requirement not met.”

Did that mean it would stop?

“Searching for qualified master… Found. Candidate number forty-seven, Gudako Fujimaru reset as master.”

The sound of her heartbeat ceased as terror washed over her. There was no way… No way in hell! She was a maid! She had known her first day being here that she would never be involved in anything important, and she had accepted that. She didn’t have a servant, she wasn’t a mage, she was useless—

“Unsummon program: start. Spiritron conversion: start.”

She was powerless to stop it. She took as much of a breath as she could in the burning room and squeezed Mashu’s hand, murmuring an apology. This was happening. This was happening...

“Rayshift starting in three…”

No time to panic anymore—she had to focus. Where was this going? Japan? Okay. Could be worse. She had lived in Japan her whole life after all. Wasn’t she craving adventure earlier? She had to embrace that feeling now.

“Two…”

So at least that wouldn’t be a huge concern. Maybe she could find help once she got there? Maybe someone here could pull her back after they saved everyone else. Maybe someone would be able to save Mashu and Ritsuka… maybe Mashu wasn’t as bad as she looked, maybe she wasn’t as cold as she felt.

“One. All procedures clear.”

Gudako would be damned if she didn’t at least _try._

“First order, commencing operation.”

**Author's Note:**

> Most of the lines of Announcement dialogue are taken straight from the game, sometimes with mild adjustments because I couldn't be bothered to come up with something similar when they were... right there. So uh, thanks Nasu and FGO EN team!
> 
> I'm basing Gudako and Ritsuka off of their canon counterparts in various capacities, though I plan to do something a little different with them too, so you can consider this an alternate reality of some sort. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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